The Bessie Fire Department is deep in preparation for the annual Bessie Pancake Supper, an event that dates back 62 years. The event, which started in 1958 as a fundraiser for the Lion’s Club in Bessie, has grown into a community event that draws people from all over western Oklahoma.
The event is scheduled for Monday, March 2, 2020, from 5:30 p.m. until 8:30 p.m. and will feature the traditional dinner of pancakes and sausage. In addition, there will be sausage available for purchase, including liver sausage and both smoked and unsmoked sausage.
The supper event has grown significantly over the years, said Bessie Fire Chief Keith Javorsky. During the first year the group served up and sold about 40 pounds of sausage, this year they plan to butcher 38 whole hogs, with the assistance of Market 54 in Weatherford, who will gut, skin, and halve the animals. Volunteers will work Friday and Saturday to prep the liver sausage and to debone, cut up, and grind the regular sausage. Some of that sausage will then go into the smokehouses. Javorksy said they anticipate having approximately 1,200 pounds of raw sausage ready for the dinner and sales.
The volunteers, Javorsky said, come not just from the Bessie Fire Deparment, but also from neighboring departments and folks from Bessie and the surrounding communities.
“We’d like to express our appreciation to the donors and volunteers who come to help,” Javorsky said. “The Bessie firemen and the guys from other departments who come to help, as well as everyone else who helps out. We’d like to thank everyone for their support.”